The Branson Centre of Entrepreneurship — Caribbean welcomed 13 Jamaican companies into its accelerator programme, wherein businesses will be intensely trained for six months to become certified business leaders in the Caribbean small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) ecosystem.

Jamaican companies Instant Save JA, RibKage, Connect Critical Infrastructure Solutions, The Book Merchant, Captured Moments, Little’s Hobby Hut Safari and Fish Farm, JL Farms, Aquatic Ornamental, Clean Harbour, Aquaworx, Oracabessa Dive Shop, Nature My Therapy, and InGen Bio, alongside Vetiver – TT of Trinidad and Tobago, Oasis Lab of Barbados, and Angel Lisa of Belize, were chosen from some 300 applicants from across the Caribbean.

The programme — which targets entrepreneurs seeking to scale their operations, increase their revenue and break into new markets — will cover business training and investment preparation as well as one year of governance guided by a board of advisors. This includes connecting entrepreneurs to pitch to local institutional investors for equity funding.

Partners of the programme include National Commercial Bank Capital Markets, PROVEN Investments, PanJam Investments, GK Capital, Jamaica Money Market Brokers Group and Norbrook Equity Partners.

According to the organisation, in 2019 it prepared US$4 million of equity deal flow for investors.

The centre primarily supports businesses in the scale-up phase, earning revenue between $25 million and $200 million.

“We’re excited to support more businesses focused on scaling in the blue economy; this presents immense expansion opportunities for regional businesses in the sector,” said Dmitri Dawkins, entrepreneur programme director.

Dawkins further added that the organisation is creating greater impact through a triple bottom line approach — ‘People, Planet, Profit’, and is therefore on a mission to facilitate gender balance in regional business leadership as 50 per cent our selected companies are led by women or have mixed-gender founding teams.

Branson Centre of Entrepreneurship – Caribbean was launched in Montego Bay, Jamaica in 2011 by business mogul Sir Richard Branson. Branson Centre stands as the Caribbean’s leading business accelerator for scale-up entrepreneurs, bringing world-class entrepreneurial support to the region and working toward its mission of creating dynamic Caribbean economies.